She thinks she knows, at any rate. I wasn’t checking her out. I was taking note of the shape she’s in—because she’s the artist I work for now, and if I’m uprooting my life to follow her, I need to know she can cut it.
In the years since I came home, I’ve gotten so used to not wanting anything, I almost believe myself.
“Did you need something, Princess?”
“Don’t be ugly,” she says, with a head snap worthy of any Southern matriarch. “Rusty and Ash asked me to check on you. Rus said if I didn’t, I’d find you here tomorrow morning still double-checking the crew’s work.” Her eyes rake over me like I’m dead leaves on dirty ground. “And would your momma let you get away with calling a grown woman ‘Princess’?”
“My momma didn’t stick around long enough to care how I treat anyone.”
The words are out before I can bite my tongue.
What is it about her that has me talking out of school? Thinking and noticing things I haven’t let myself think or notice in a long, long time?
She’s a digger. She’s not content with whatever’s on the surface. Must be all that legal training.
She can’t let things go.
Ineedher to let things go.
“Shame on her,” Lou says, her pale blue eyes colder than ice. “But you still don’t get to call me Princess.”
I snort, thankful she’s not pushing this, at least. “You got it, Darlin’.”
Her flat blink could almost make me smile.
But then she chuckles. “You’ve been around Rusty too much. All those adorable nicknames he gives Ash are rubbing off on you.”
“What woman doesn’t love a nickname?”
“This one,” she says, holding my gaze hostage. “At least not when you say it like it’s a four-letter word.”
I can’t help the smirk that wrinkles my eyes. “Is that what you heard?”
“Is that what you meant?”
The air between us is as thick and dense as humidity but as fresh as an ocean breeze.
“You should rest,” I say.
“You should learn to answer a question.” She gives me one more look before walking off.
I exhale more easily without the weight of those light eyes on me. But something about her doesn’t let me watch her leave. Least not without getting the last word.
“You’re making a mistake,” I say to her back. “In your set.”
She does a half turn and looks at me outta the corner of her eye. “How so?”
“Your encore.It’s Always Sonnymight be your biggest single, but you should finish withLast Train to Midnight.”
She steps back toward me. “I thought you hadn’t listened to my music?”
“I have to. It’s part of the job,” I say, even though I know what she’s getting at. And that makes me feel like I’m swallowing glass.
“Last Train to Midnightisn’t on my setlist.”
“It should be,” I say, swallowing down the shards. “It’s good. Great, even.”
The corners of her sharp eyes soften in curiosity. Uncertainty. “It’s hardly the anthem you end a night on.”
